The Russian Orthodox Church’s representative to the European International Institutions Bishop Hilarion of Vienna and Austria, on Interfax-Religion’s request, commented on the recent suggestion of Danish Lutheran theologians to consider the hell and the devil a metaphor and to accept only existence of the paradise.

Meanwhile, the Eastern Christian tradition has never considered the hell as created by God to punish sinners. God didn’t create the hell, free will of people has created it. It exists not because God wants it, but because people keep it existing. They first create the hell on Earth and then carry it on to the afterworld.

Question a friend, perhaps he did not do it; but if he did anything so that he may do it no more.A hasty quarrel kindles fire,and urgent strife sheds blood.If you blow on a spark, it will glow;if you spit on it, it will be put out; and both come out of your mouth

Did not Jesus Himself say that hell was created for the Devil and his angels? So it's true that He did not create it for man but this statement certainly seems to indicate that God did in fact create hell.

Did not Jesus Himself say that hell was created for the Devil and his angels? So it's true that He did not create it for man but this statement certainly seems to indicate that God did in fact create hell.

Where do you see God being identified of the agent of creation in that sentence?

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Question a friend, perhaps he did not do it; but if he did anything so that he may do it no more.A hasty quarrel kindles fire,and urgent strife sheds blood.If you blow on a spark, it will glow;if you spit on it, it will be put out; and both come out of your mouth

"These [sinners] shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes, in that Day, to be glorified in His saints and to be admired among all those who believe, because our testimony among you was believed" (2 Tes 1:9-10).

This passage suggests that the presence of God will be both a reward for the righteous and a punishment (hell/gehenna) for the sinners.

Where do you see God being identified of the agent of creation in that sentence?

I had never thought of it that way. I do agree w/ the Orthodox view that the experience of hell is not the result of God actively torturing people. But this statement by Christ does strongly indicate that God did take an active role in the existence of hell for the fallen angels by the use of the word prepared. Yet, I guess one could construe this to mean that hell came about as the result of the Devil and company's fall from grace. But still, that's seems to me to be stretching the rather obvious meaning in Christ's use of the word prepared. Obviously, no one else in creation could have prepared a place like this, so Who else could have done it but God?

Let me get this straight. A bunch of Danish Lutheran "theologians" wanted the Orthodox to come to their side to suggest that hell (Hades, Gehenna, etc.) is nothing more than a metaphor? Lutheranism has come a long way. Luther, Crusius, Andreae, Chemnitiz and Melanchton would spin in their graves!